One literary mystery
For many years has puzzled me
About a famous tragedy
Notorious for dif-fi'-culty:
If old King H did not return
From that far, undiscovered bourn
A few months after his decease
But told no tales and held his peace
(Which is, as ancient proverbs state,
So seemly and appropriate
For those who happen to be dead):
Who would Prince Hamlet then have wed?
At first it seems an easy call.
He loved Ophelia after all
Full forty thousand times as much
As brothers, cousins, aunts, and such.
He courted her aggressively
With mediocre poetry.
They bantered in off-color jests.
He praised her excellent white breasts.
So surely, in another life,
Ophelia would have been his wife.
But contemplating it, I fear,
It really isn't very clear
What Hamlet's true intentions were:
Why hadn't he proposed to her?
Ophelia tells her nosy dad
Her ardent suitor Hamlet had
Made almost every holy vow.
But Hamlet hadn't up to now
Declared to her explicitly,
"I love you. Will you marry me?"
Laertes may have well been right
That, in the end, Prince Hamlet might
Defer to the necessity
Of marrying politically.
Some Princess of a foreign land
Would get the Prince's heart and hand.
I worry for that poor Princess
For knowing Hamlet, I would guess
The marriage won't be a success.
I think the melancholy Dane
Would oft iambically complain
About the undeservéd fate
Imposed on royal heads of state
Who must, when they select a mate,
Ignore their love, however great.
In endless speeches to the Queen
He'd say how happy he'd have been
Could he have married his true love:
A theme the Queen grows tired of.
And then there's the alternative
In which the Prince decides to live
With true love as his only guide.
He spurns ambition, rank, and pride.
Despising the ignoble tricks
Of matrimonial politics,
He takes Ophelia as his bride.
I don't feel at all confident
That that would make him more content.
My guess would be that, all too soon,
Not long after their honeymoon,
He'd find his wife as tedious,
And stupid as Polonius.
He'd gibe at her with prods and pokes
And many cruel sarcastic jokes.
He'd fret that Denmark lost the chance
To ally with the King of France
Because of this ill-judged romance.
When drunk, he would declaim that she
Should go off to a nunnery.
I'd also guess that either way,
(Though obviously none can say)
Like many other married kings
He'd have a lot of sordid flings,
Unsatisfactory and short,
With ladies of the royal court.
In Shakespeare's dramas, there's a lot
Of loving pairs who tie the knot,
And many of them, I can tell
Suit one another really well.
So Fenton and sweet Annie Page
Will prosper once they've left the stage.
Poor Juliet and Romeo,
Wise Portia and Bassanio,
And France and fair Cordelia,
And Oliver and Celia,
And Benedict and Beatrice
Seem suited for connubial bliss.
I think the Prince of Elsinore
Had best remain a ba-che-lor.